egypt's opposition threatens to storm the presidential palace amid nationwide protests against the country's leader mohamed morsi. and earlier this week the birthplace of the arab spring tunisia witnessed a similar scenes of unrest as anti-government protests were sparked by the assassination of a prominent opposition figure. soon to be cia chief john brennan went through a confirmation hearing amid cat calls and protest but it's still hard to tell where the architect of the targeted assassination program will take america's five year. and russia counts down to the two thousand and fourteen winter olympics the games are promised to be the most expensive in history with huge overspending already costing a key organizer his job. and

taking a look back at the news that shaped the headlines over the last seven days this is the weekly i'm sometimes going to have you with us egypt opposition has called for more rallies and threaten to storm the presidential palace the protesters accuse mohamed morsi of not upholding the goals of the revolution that ousted hosni mubarak two years ago the turmoil has also been fueled by the authorities decision to block the video sharing web site you tube in the country for a month over its anti islamic content but as artie's belcher reports the decision is not only likely to inflame more tensions. there's been a lot of condemnation of the band by protest movements to see you cheap as a vital resource for disseminating information about human rights abuses by the security forces it's also an indication of an islam mine zation all egypt has been a number of quite controversial statements made by these hardline muslim clerics in

the last few weeks including a religious edict calling opposition forces to be killed and a muslim cleric speaking to an egyptian channel justifying sex mob attacks on egyptian protesters in tahrir square you have a very restive country here in egypt in the last few weeks especially since the second anniversary of the january twenty five revolution when thousands gathered in the streets of egypt set complaining that their president had mostly have not made key changes in demands of the revolution friday we saw more protests as part of friday's day of security thousands of protesters gathered across the main running points in this in the country which devolved into clashes between anti-government protesters and security forces in the capital here by the presidential palace when groups are attacked by the building out with molotov they're pushed back by take us and with the comments bloody of violence in the in the governor with that same couple shake as well as violent clashes and alex. we have more protests on the horizon with rather expected violence we don't see this finishing anytime soon

gyptian journalist and blogger while as congress has president morsi and his allies the actions are causing the country's citizens to become increasingly disillusioned . but the muslim brotherhood right now is trying to do is restore autocratic rule and much like or. governing and i think the way the political actors see it is that when barak was not ruthless enough and did not sign down on freedoms enough to sustain his rule and this is what they're trying to remedy the you tube verdict comes in light of. you know many other decisions that clamp down on freedoms. and it's no surprise that they will try to install the infrastructure necessary to clamp down on. various websites that they see as a threat to their rule where we're going to see more waves of protests and we're going to see more violence because if you look at the situation in egypt the regime did not die the symbols just changed we just have new people following the same

rules. another country rocked by and rest of this week was tunisia public fieri vera has been ignited following the murder of a secular opposition leader. reid dozens were injured and more than three hundred people detained during the rallies which ended with anti-government demonstrators clashing with police artie's maria for an ocean and has been following the dramatic developments in the tunisian capital forty eight year old lawyer shockley ability to criticize the islam is to government for creating and really just state in tunisia and burying democracy now delight is dead but his ideas are not an easy of. the country's been in crisis economic political and social the ruling troika how to chauncey it's been a year and a half but we didn't see any progress the death of a comrade becomes the last straw. anger moved to the streets with protesters

demanding the authorities and mabel to protect its citizens to leave the city with. some crime because believe was a symbol of dignity and a symbol of the defense of the country this is a political assassination and that means the violence is not over the political short people can lose yet the interior ministry said that one million in the have joined the ceremony that turned into a political manifestation people said that if the crowd reached the city center it would have been the last day of the government. as your attend the funeral of shockley belayed on friday after the seventy try to make their way to visit is made of and yet to continue to get an protests if they were not allowed to do that police used tear gas immediately was such a central city is packed with people the slogans we are hearing are completely different. i carry an islamist flags people masterly in support

of the ruling and not a party the local branch of the muslim brotherhood police were at the scene to protest and demonstrators this time this reverse gathering didn't pull more than five thousand participants but the government used this to illustrate that their position was still strong looking into men did it prove that people support and believe our party needs all of our revenue or they try to say face but don't have the choice they lost credibility and have no choice but to dissolve the government which is by de facto dissolved already. standing on the brink of a political crisis prime minister proposed to form a new cabinet and consisting of neutral politicians his own party rejected the plan and christenings idea of a possible farthest pleat and fears a growing that the political divisions may lead to even more victims because i was threaten to another guy from the opposition was attacked at the funerals i don't

want to panic and say x.y.z. that person but there is a list of people those who fight for the revolutions principles liberty democracy dignity we're all in danger to use a go tunisia became the first nation to have an arab spring revolution that has been hailed as a success story praised for the minimal violence and turmoil but as we watch the country face a political implosion it may be only now it is free and it has been wound up tightly it's been sprung for three days clashes between police and protesters shook the country leaving many injured and cars burnt out across the city but it all finished as quickly as it started just hours later the capital looks empty and calm and the loudest noise here at the moment is sound of birds twittering humiliation national t d's yeah. and meanwhile in the streets of europe are also lacking

a stability. as a wave of countrywide protests hit spain and ireland this week with people expressing their discontent over austerity policies the story and much more later in the program. john brennan brock obama's pick to head the cia and the architect of the drone assassination program had his a senate confirmation hearing this week while critics accuse the lawmakers of giving john brennan an easy ride some members of the public weren't shy in expressing their disapproval multiple protesters interrupted the sessions raising posters accusing brennan of being the dry. having force behind the so-called targeted killing operations human rights activists claim the use of drones against suspected terrorists is unlawful and leads to a high number of civilian casualties after demonstrators were removed from the hall lawmakers questioned brennan on torture and the cia shortcomings however critics claimed those inquiries seemed strictly ceremonial time scholar and author calling

the cattle says event given brennan's interviews his confirmation could set a trouble president. this is a complete denial of our constitutional rights under the fourteenth amendment due process more and equal protection of the law and yet when the administration is doing here is there usurping the constitutional right denying him to the american citizens and saying that we can be judged jury and executioner we can do you know american citizens abroad without them having their court we can say they aren't yours and we can kill them and the danger is this is when you look at ministrations says we can determine who was yours then that means go anywhere in any american citizen. without any trial without any problems and that is a very dangerous precedent. on tuesday john brennan is set to go through

a closed door classified hearing to iron out sensitive technicalities the debate is already brewing about what direction he could take the cia as artie's going to church can comment. in the shadows no more drones are moving into the mainstream with drone makers and the u.s. military pushing to defend the killing machine drones are more properly titled remotely piloted vehicles allow us to do is to project capability without projecting vulnerability in their revolutionizing warfare by allowing us to see and cue from half a world away a major drone manufacturer lockheed martin has financed an hour long documentary on drones aired recently on u.s. public television touting the technological capabilities of the killing machine from trailers like this pilots of the predator and its larger cousin the reaper have killed thousands of individual since two thousand and one using remotely

piloted aircraft contrary to popular belief actually provides the greatest degree of ethical oversight for their use and this young man in pakistan would probably disagree several of his family members died at the remote hands of a drone more than a thousand other civilians were reportedly killed by u.s. drone strikes in pakistan and yemen we find ourselves murdering people in many cases children with no evidence whatsoever that they're involved in any criminal or terrorist activity the numbers should not come as a surprise considering the broad definition the obama administration gives us to who should be on their kill list the leaked memo uncredited assassinations from the us justice department suggests the us government can kill people even without evidence that they are actively plotting against america somebody a us citizen or otherwise is believed to be thinking something that could lead to actions against the united states then this illogical logic would present the idea

that it would be ok for the president to order that that person be chill despite the un raising concerns about the legality of the use of drones the us is said to expand its. remote control warfare setting up new drone bases across the world has redefined war during intervention in libya he made the case that the war powers act didn't apply because there was no risk to american soldiers and so under that rationale he can expand the global war while in his state of the union address queening that we don't need perpetual war for peace but it is perpetual war when you can drop bombs on any country and then claim that it's not working john brennan often referred to as the architect of the administration's drone war counts the new opportunities for the us to wage wars without risking american lives there is another reason the targeted strikes can be a wise choice for the strategic consequences that inevitably come with the use of

force. as we have seen deploying large armies abroad won't always be our best offense all in all the u.s. now has around ten thousand drones in its fleet not all of them carry weapons of course a lot of them are for surveillance both domestic and international there's a great push both from the administration and the drone makers to present them as america's next best thing john brennan if confirmed will soon be at the helm of the cia and no one doubts that under him the program will expand even further in washington i'm going to stick around. and of course we have more news after the break i'll be back in just a bit. there's is trash to get rid of. but it's also

a treasure. that's worth fighting for. and a trap with no way out. peeves . fifty feet fifty. feet deep. purple. world of the science technology innovation all the list of elements from around russia we've got the

future covered. back with the weekly this is r t glad to have you with us massive strikes have shaken the streets of spain this week as tens of thousands of teachers and students voiced their anger over education cuts but the government seems to be turning a blind eye to the crowds and says it is committed to belt tightening measures as it struggles to dig the country out of its debt hole the message from the people of spain was echoed on the streets of ireland where tens of thousands of trade unionists gathered in a massive show of anger against severe austerity measures tough cuts were implemented to please ireland's creditors it's been that relying on a joint e.u. international monetary fund alone since two thousand and ten. and angry crowds have been spoiling the mood of the e.u. leaders as they celebrate and historic a budget deal cutting the blocks spending for the first time ever however the bill

left the european parliament unimpressed with its m.p.'s now planning to block it in a private vote economist james midway weighs in. constitutionally they're well within their rights to reject the thing and send it back and have another go at writing this now whether they actually do that will probably depend on the fine print in the budget or already present the e.u. parliament to said it would be able to support the steel and the heads of one of the major groups in the parliament the socialist group there is said there are likely to be support it so it can be a rocky ride i think this budget over the next few months cameron's right talk about this being like a reduction in a credit card limits and of course you can have your credit card limit reduced and still spend carry on spending more money now that's almost certainly what's going to happen to britain over the next few years the amounts that britain is expected to pay into the main e.u. fund will increase as a result of increased payments to the new member countries so he's going to pretend that this will show how britain can still be

a force in europe how we can push the rest of europe around this glosses over the fact of course that he wouldn't have got anywhere in this without the support of the angle of merkel in particular so he can even try to push that line that you know he knows what he's doing to europe and that we don't need to go so far as to step out of the european union but i wouldn't see the more euro skeptic members of his own party being particularly impressed by any of this. now let's take a look at some other news making headlines around the world this hour at least twenty people have been reportedly killed in a stampede at a railroad station in northern india after a crowded overpass collapsed the local media says the death toll could rise from the accident occurred as tens of millions gathered on the banks of the ganges river a. religious festival. in the u.s. a one million dollar reward is being offered for any information leading to the arrest of the axe l.a.p.d. officer who has declared war on his former colleagues it is the fourth day of the

manhunt for christopher dorner the dismissed officer accused of three murders officials promise that they will look into the fugitives allegations of racism and corruption among his ex colleagues it has created the uproar on the internet. have caused severe flooding are leaving at least six people dead in peru's southern city of. thousands of people were left without electricity and drinking water at least two bridges were destroyed as well cutting the city off from neighboring villages kruse a rainy season typically begins in february often resulting in heavy flooding and landslides they planned multibillion dollar u.s. defense shield in new europe might not actually be able to fulfill its announced a goal to protect america from a possible iranian nuke. excuse me missile strikes the flaws were highlighted in classified studies made by the defense department prepared for a congressional briefing russia has long been critical of the missile shield close

to its borders which the u.s. insists is aimed strictly at preventing attacks from iran and north korea alice slater new york director of the nuclear age peace foundation says that the machine has little to do with defense and is merely driven by the us is policy of world domination. we know this is being driven by cooperate commercial interests there but when president eisenhower was the military industrial complex and the tasks that they've been doing over the years that started back with reagan with his we called it star was at the time they didn't they don't work they have fixed they rig the target so everybody knows it's not working and yet the machine keeps crying and it's had a terrible. relationship with spares the soviet union and now russia the syrian opposition leader says he is willing to negotiate with president assad's representatives in the north of the country but this comes as heavy fighting in the

capital rages on which was the rebels attracting damascus with mortar shells and roadside bombs they also seized several neighborhoods but were soon pushed out by a government counteroffensive dr ali mohamed from syria tribune says web site says even if the opposition succeeds in its quest to remove president assad the crisis will be far from over it's just funny it's just like all of this will be lived through and the sun will be nicer ones different than it is now and that's enough of that if you have a d.v.d. he cannot actually call and they try even when the user has listed. it on it's a blacklist the with not of defending it because the movie chemical totally so normal be because lucian is dreaming you believe that they can control the groups up to the top leader the vision the odds of winning and the most important point is that these are the princes and the will if you created people they are not full of

the shoes they are not the fighters for freedom they are just workplaces and the coalition will only be able to do the work of its founder and main financing. entity we asked them to do and if they don't do that they will lose this financing they would lose the support so they have to do this and have people know how to who and they cannot because they are not united and they don't have the same view was so it's a big mess and yet the west would like to see this big mess fall in the country. meanwhile in his last public appearance before retiring the pentagon chief leon panetta admitted he backed the plan of arming syrian rebels however the white house reportedly vetoed the idea russia's envoy to the un told r.t. that despite this the u.s. still has a lot to do with the ongoing crisis in syria vitaly churkin exclusive interviews coming your way in about two hours time but here is a quick preview but they are not as they chose to stay clean of the bad guys at

some point of the crisis the did realize it seems that things going very wrong you know that various terrorist groups were coming in that the radical islamists the we're we're we're active and the original scenario they had in mind that it would take just a couple of months to topple the assad regime and then sort of democracy will triumph was completely unrealistic but i mean do notice this is an extremely powerful country definitely with a lot of an influence on for example such a country as qatar which is reportedly of the main source of weapons and support for for armed opposition so the fact they simply say that they themselves are not doing that does not does not really absolve them completely from responsibility of what is happening in the. well what once a looked like a deceased distant tellin big dream for russians has now become

a very close reality the countdown has kicked off across the country marking one year before russia host its first ever winter games but celebrations and praise for the unique facilities are built from scratch went hand in hand with harsh criticism for overspending and mr ed lives artes and her farmer reports from social. fireworks lit up the sochi sky this week marking exactly a year to go before the winter games begin since two thousand and seven piece by piece the city has been putting its a limpid dream together in the company in charge of construction says russia will be ready and. we plan to introduce all the facilities before the games start training facilities are ready practically all of them of hosted test competitions all hotels in the olympic villages are in the final phase of construction being refurbished and furnished the shuttles to open in the autumn we plan to complete construction long before the end of the year so personnel can train and managers

can gain experience in providing good service however such a vast undertaking has not been without its problems presentation was in the region this week to check on progress and was taking no prisoners the ski jumping center the only venue not yet up and running and it sparked this exchange with russian olympic officials are the costs of this whole facility cost what's the overall. initially we were assessing the amount of. what's a rough estimate. this initial price of one point two billion. was one point two billion has turned into a billion yes well done good work let's move on. it resulted in the sacking of a key member of russia's alan thicke committee at fifty billion dollars the sochi games will be the most expensive in nearly history they have cost ten times more than the last winter games in vancouver and ten billion dollars more than the she knew

somebody gains however the results can already be seen and they are impressive if you do take a quick look around you can see what money can buy at the center of the limping which is six pennies all within a stone's throw of each other to host the curling the skating and the ice hockey and this is the. and in the crime the bolshoi i studied. the past arena was she strikes spectacular skating show i was part of the countdown celebrations and in a year's time it will face the and in the ice hockey final in d.c. meet subtropical like ation the slogan for thought she twenty fourteen is hot cool your top because they don't pick pockets than by the blacks in case they're on cold because all the alpine events or take place alone just forty kilometers away. progress is rapid day there as a result has sprung up from nowhere to become the home of alpine skiing by athlone

and cross-country courses have also been created along with the bob sleigh track and a road to really well and i spectators to get from the mountains to the coast in just a few minutes thought she itself has undergone massive upheaval as calamities of road am rail lines are put in place and new hotels are built but the man believes the region will reap the benefits for years to come our residents are aware of the conditions they have to face during changes especially on this scale we certainly have many inconveniences because there's not a single street in sochi without renovation going on the roads are regularly dug up there but which causes traffic jams all the time however the residents are aware that it's necessary for their future brilliant future. then has been overhauled in just six years but the transformation easel most complete and the black sea resort believes it can and will deliver the games to remember this time next year andrew

farmer. softly. the olympic spirit also ridge to new york this week where un chief ban ki moon joined the celebrations at the organization's headquarters for those of you who want to see the sochi games in person tickets are already available and available online. of course we've got more stories for you online including a no from washington officials on building and death star well didn't stop persistent star wars fans fund raising from the web site kickstarter now allows you to personally finance the creation of the ultimate weapon of destruction more than three hundred fifty thousand dollars has already been raised. and french police.